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For many of his humbler subjects the Scotland of James VI and his successors was a place of fearful terror and
excruciating pain. The condemned, the tortured, the banished and the maimed were, in the main, ordinary people who experienced the most sustained and brutal period of persecution in the entire annals of Scottish
history. Over 3000 cases of witch hunting are on record between 1590 and 1700. More than one third of the accused were subsequently executed, 80 per cent of them female. Many other cases have doubtless been forgotten.
The architect of this carnage was James himself. In the name of God a seven year old girl in Orkney was put to the thumbscrews. Isobel Menteith of Aberdeen committed suicide in prison. Donald Moir, a miller in
Inverness, was burned for charming Robert Stewart's child. Bartie Paterson, a pieceworker in Newbattle, was strangled and burned on the Castlehill of Edinburgh for passing off poisoned drinks as medicine. Groups of
women in Brechin, Bo'ness and Inverkeithing, among other places, were tortured and exterminated. These and many others were the hapless victims of the great Scottish witch hunt, launched by James, which would last for
over a century. The psychopaths and the torturers, the deluded and the crazed, were as much victims as the falsely accused; without the publicity of the witch-hunt they would have lacked outlets for their aggressions
and anxieties. The phenomenon of witchcraft presents a baffling, if irresistible, puzzle. Numerous accounts, such as court records and confessions, testify to activities that are nothing short of
incredible night flying, diabolical assemblies (complete with pipe music), intercourse with demons, far fetched spells and conjuration's with mind boggling consequences. The ideas and mental attitudes embedded in
the witch scare have long since been consigned to the junk heap of history, but not the desire to explain them. Why did James and his advisers, sane and able men proud of their rationality and intellectual prowess,
permit such atrocities? Were there actually witches? The past is not always a pleasant place and witchcraft is a repugnant subject but we must scrutinise the dark stains, as well as the dazzling patterns, in the fabric
of our history. As we look back on the charred landscape of 17th century Scotland we may be uncomfortably aware that, even in our own supposedly enlightened day, new witch hunts religious, political or racial are a
sadly recurrent feature. Like many other European episodes the witch craze arrived late in Scotland. It was almost 100 years old before the country was seized by the first major scare in 1590, although earlier isolated
cases are on record. David Seton of Tranent detected suspicious behaviour on the part of his maid, Gellie Duncan. She was cruelly tortured and the 'devil's mark'- witches supposedly had special marks that were
insensitive when pricked by needles- was found on her body. It transpired that Gellie had participated in a sabbat (witches' gathering) at North Berwick kirk, providing hellish folk music on her Jew's harp.
The congregation boasted some illustrious members: Agnes Sampson, the wise woman of Keith Humby in East Lothian; Ritchie Graham, a notorious necromancer from the Borders; Barbara Napier, wife of an Edinburgh burgess;
John Cunningham, schoolmaster from Prestonpans; Euphemie MacKalzane, daughter of a judge - altogether over 100 persons 'where of there was six men and all the rest was women'. The Devil himself addressed them from the
pulpit. 'His face was terrible, his nose was like the beak of an eagle, great burnin een, his hands and legs was hairy, with claws upon his hands and feet like the griffon and he spoke with a rough, deep voice'. They
were gathered for a veritable 'deed without a name' - the destruction of the king. James had recently been in Denmark to collect his bride, Anne. The witches allegedly plotted to prevent his safe return. They had tried
venom of toads, wax dolls and spells involving pieces of royal underwear, without success. They now experimented with charmed cats, grasped by the tail and swung three times round the head widdershins (that is against
the direction of the sun) before being hurled into the waters of the Forth to conjure storms. When James was informed he feigned disbelief, until Agnes Sampson gave a confidential and detailed account of what had gone
on during his wedding night. Thereupon the king solemnly recalled that on the North Sea crossing his ship alone experienced unnatural turbulence although the rest of the fleet sailed in calm water. From that point
onwards James took a close, not to say obsessive, interest in the details of witch trials. The outcome was far from calm. Many of those supposedly involved in the North Berwick affair were to suffer hideous torture and
agonising death. Euphemie MacKalzane was burned alive while Agnus Sampson was more 'mercifully' treated - she was strangled before being consigned to the flames. When Barbara Napier claimed to be pregnant James himself
ordered that physicians should examine her, 'if she be not, to the fire with her presently and cause bowel (disembowel) her publicly'. John Cunningham refused to confess his guilt, even though his legs were broken in
the notorious 'boot'. He was the subject of a sensational tract, Netves From Scotland, which recounted in lurid detail how he had attempted to seduce the sister of one of his pupils and which contained much elaborate
nonsense on his career as a warlock. Before Ritchie Graham was executed he revealed that the mastermind behind the entire conspiracy was one of the greatest in the land, Francis Stewart, earl of Bothwell, the madcap
cousin of the king. All of Scotland, and indeed England, was aghast!  |
